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Thus we have even here the means of knowing the nature of the
Intellectual-Principle, though, seeing it more closely than
anything else, we still see it at less than its worth. We know
that it exists but its cause we do not see, or, if we do, we see
that cause as something apart. We see a man- or an eye, if you
like- but this is an image or part of an image; what is in that
Principle is at once Man and the reason of his being; for There
man- or eye- must be, itself, an intellective thing and a cause
of its being; it could not exist at all unless it were that
cause, whereas here, everything partial is separate and so is the
cause of each. In the Intellectual, all is at one so that the
thing is identical with the cause.
Even here the thing and its cause are often identical- an eclipse
furnishes an example- what then is there to prevent other things
too being identical with their cause and this cause being the
essence of the thing? It must be so; and by this search after the
cause the thing's essence is reached, for the essence of a thing
is its cause. I am not here saying that the informing Idea is the
cause of the thing- though this is true- but that the Idea
itself, unfolded, reveals the cause inherent in it.
A thing of inactivity, even though alive, cannot include its own
cause; but where could a Forming-Idea, a member of the
Intellectual-Principle, turn in quest of its cause? We may be
answered "In the Intellectual-Principle"; but the two are not
distinct; the Idea is the Intellectual-Principle; and if that
Principle must contain the Ideas complete, their cause must be
contained in them. The Intellectual-Principle itself contains
every cause of the things of its content; but these of its
content are identically Intellectual-Principle, each of them
Intellectual-Principle; none of them, thus, can lack its own
cause; each springs into being carrying with it the reason of its
being. No result of chance, each must rise complete with its
cause; it is an integral and so includes the excellence bound up
with the cause. This is how all participants in the Idea are put
into possession of their cause.
In our universe, a coherent total of multiplicity, the several
items are linked each to the other, and by the fact that it is an
all every cause is included in it: even in the particular thing
the part is discernibly related to the whole, for the parts do
not come into being separately and successively but are mutually
cause and caused at one and the same moment. Much more in the
higher realm must all the singles exist for the whole and each
for itself: if then that world is the conjoint reality of all, of
an all not chance-ruled and not sectional, the cause There must
include the causes: every item must hold, in its very nature, the
uncaused possession of its cause; uncaused, independent and
standing apart from cause, they must be self-contained, cause and
all.
Further, since nothing There is chance-sprung, and the
multiplicity in each comprehends the entire content, then the
cause of every member can be named; the cause was present from
the beginning, inherent, not a cause but a fact of the being; or,
rather, cause and manner of being were one. What could an Idea
have, as cause, over and above the Intellectual-Principle? It is
a thought of that Principle and cannot, at that, be considered as
anything but a perfect product. If it is thus perfect we cannot
speak of anything in which it is lacking nor cite any reason for
such lack. That thing must be present, and we can say why. The
why is inherent, therefore, in the entity, that is to say in
every thought and activity of the Intellectual-Principle. Take
for example the Idea of Man; Man entire is found to contribute to
it; he is in that Idea in all his fulness including everything
that from the beginning belonged to Man. If Man were not complete
There, so that there were something to be added to the Idea, that
additional must belong to a derivative; but Man exists from
eternity and must therefore be complete; the man born is the
derivative.
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